


The Women of Rickon Stark, Lord of Winterfell

by Sookiestark



Series: Fantastic, Frivolous, and Fragile AU's [11]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, House Stane, House Stark, Rickon Lives, Skagos, The Grand Northern Conspiracy, Warging
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-08-20 06:03:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20223019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sookiestark/pseuds/Sookiestark
Summary: What if Rickon survived? What if he was never captured by Ramsay? This is going to be a story about Rickon Stark, Lord of Winterfell and what might have happened...





	1. Chapter 1

Osha knew the boy was hungry and cold. Their tent was not as good at keeping out the cold as it had been when they were further south. She could feel it, the chill from the Wall and the lands beyond the Wall. She did not like being this close but the boy might find some protection in Skagos, where men might follow an oath given. She hoped. 

Osha had not been the kind of woman given to hopes and dreams. She was of the Free Folk and she knew a hard life where if you were caught in dreams, you would die. Life was too hard to be anything but firmly in the present. Only in the fat and comfortable southern lands, girls could be given to dreams and hopes. 

But she had begun to hope that they would find a safe place in Skagos. The little Lord needed it. He needed safety and comfort, even if he rarely complained. She could tell he was hungry and cold. The first few days after they left Winterfell, he had cried for cream and butter, for fireplaces and a soft bed, for his toy sword. Rickon’s brother had been with them then and he had comforted as best as he could. He had told him if they could get to their brother, Jon Snow, all would be well. Rickon had needed his brother’s words and his embrace and wiped his eyes as brave as a boy could be who had grown up in safety.

When they had parted, Osha had not gone to Castle Black. She did not trust the Crows and their steel. She did not like the idea of it. Where was this Jon Snow when he heard his brother’s needed him? Where was he? A man who did not come when his family needed him was no man. Osha did not care about his vows as a Black Brother. His first vow was to his blood and he had not come. She did not trust him or any part of the Night’s Watch. When Rickon cried for Jon Snow, she told him, “Let the Crows keep the company of Crows. We will go to Skagos. In Skagos, they speak the language of giants, worship the Old Gods. There are unicorns and caves filled with dragon glass. The men that live in Skagos will keep you safe and we will return on day." 

She had kept near the Wall and could see it on the left as they headed east to the sea. She did not want to get lost. During the day, she would forage and hunt as they moved. It slowed them down but it kept them fed. 

In the past few months, Osha had come to love the boy. He reminded her of another boy, much younger, who had died many years ago. She felt a swell in her heart when she would hear his voice in the morning and she did not want any harm to befall him. They were almost to the sea and she could begin to smell the salt in the air and the chill of the water in her bones. They could board a boat at Eastwatch and go to Skagos. Osha would need to haggle and persuade but she was certain they could find a passage to the island. 

The boy’s wolf, a giant black beast, stayed near the boy and she knew they were closer to the town. When they were in the woods, the wolf had wandered, sometimes disappearing for hours. But now, Shaggy was always near and Osha took that to mean they were close to the town and to people and danger. 

She would be wary. She would watch. After all, she was a spearwife of the Free Folk, even if she had grown softer among the kneelers. She could protect her sweet little Lord, with his eyes river blue and his hair like fire in the sun. 

Yesterday night, when they had laid near each other, shivering in the darkness, Shaggy had lumbered in their tent and laid down by the boy, resting his face on his paws. Osha had known the boy had called the wolf because he was cold. Rickon had scratched the wolf’s ears and told him that he was a good boy. 

Then, Rockon had snuggled near her and called her Mother. She had thought to correct him but she had let the word lie there among them like blankets and cold air. In the morning, she had gently corrected him, reminding him his Mother was in the south with his brother and that when they returned, Rickon would reunite with them. 

Rickon had looked at her and said in an angry voice, “Mothers don’t leave. You are the only Mother I have now. Let the other one stay in the south.”

Osha had cautioned him to not say such things in anger, that the gods listened. But the boy was stubborn and quick-tempered. He was full of wolf blood or at least that was how the old man, Maester Luwin, had described him. Osha thought that was a perfect description of the boy, Lord Rickon, her boy. 

They just needed to get to Skagos


	2. Lady Aldrith - 302

Aldrith was thinking and she could not sleep. She was thinking about strange things and this strange land. This land looked similar to Skagos but it was still very strange. But this was to be her new home regardless of if it made any sense to her. Her father had sent her here with a hundred of the best men he had to secure her as Lady of Winterfell. The man, who was the true heir to Winterfell, rode a fine horse her father had given him beside her and had a sword on his hip. But Aldrith knew he could not use it. Only recently had he grown enough to hold it without his arms shaking from the weight. Truth be told, Lord Rickon Stark was still very much a child, not a man at all.

Lady Aldrith, as her father demanded she be called, was the second daughter of Lord Beorn Stane’s brood of eight children. It was Lord Stane of Driftwood Hall who had sheltered little Lord Rickon and his foster mother Lady Osha. Osha had protested the title but her father had insisted. Aldrith knew it was because he wanted to create more pomp and credibility around Rickon. After all, when was it that the Starks had visited Skagos? When had they ever needed help from House Stane? 

Lord Beorn might be an uncivilized Skagg to these mainlanders but he was not stupid. He saw Lord Rickon as an opportunity. Aldrith’s father was a man who was patient and he waited, biding his time. She knew he did care for the boy. Rickon and his wolf had been given a room, as well as a place beside her father in the hall and a horn of ale to drink. Rickon had been given the training befitting any lord’s son in Skagos. So when Ser Marlon Manderly and his party landed looking for the boy and his big black wolf, her father, Lord Beorn Stane had moved quickly.

Before the mainlanders had reached Driftwood Hall, Lord Stane had sacrificed a huge auroch to the Old Gods, ordered a feast for his men, and married Aldrith to the boy. Ser Marlon had found them put to bed, anointed with the blood of the sacrifice and the blue paint of the seer covering their body in blessings. Of course, nothing had happened. Rickon was still a child and he was more embarrassed and annoyed at the idea they might have to sleep beside each other. 

Aldrith had thought the mainlanders would force him to put her aside. After all, it had not been consummated. However, Rickon had refused.

“I like her hair. She is kissed by fire.” is all Rickon had said of Aldrith. 

Osha, Ser Marlon. and her father had cleared the hall to negotiate. In less than an hour, it was finished. Her father would give the boy a hundred men with steel, including Algar, and twenty-five horse, to press his claim for his seat of Winterfell. In exchange for this, Lord Rickon would keep Lady Aldrith as his wife. 

Aldrith was not a stupid girl like some girls were. She knew marriage for her would not be for love or desire. It was a business transaction that would benefit her father and her House. She had just thought her husband would be old and fat. Instead, she had been married to a boy five years her younger. Her brother, Wulf had teased she was literally robbing a cradle for her husband. Her sister Eda had said in five years maybe the boy might be strong enough to hold a sword and know how to use it. 

Aldrith had wanted to be a Sheild Maiden. Her father allowed her because she knew she was his favorite of his three daughters. She was the only one to look like her mother. She was the only one with the red hair and green eyes her mother had. There was a small benefit to marrying such a young mainlander. Another man would make her put her sword away once she was married. After all, once a woman was wed, there would be no time for steel when they must birth and care for babies. But whether it was ignorance or kindness, Rickon had allowed her to keep her sword. Aldrith did not know. Lord Rickon and Aldrith did not share a room or even talk that much. 

Ser Marlon Manderly had escorted them to Eastwatch-By-The-Sea and into the hands of the Night’s Watch. Her husband’s oldest brother was the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch and it was he, Lord Jon Snow, who had ordered the empty castles of the Wall be staffed, even if it was with wildings. The Night’s Watch would not help them but they would not turn him over to Lord Bolton, who had taken her husband’s claim by treachery and sealed it by marrying his eldest sister, Sansa, to his heir. 

Every day they would ride along the paths near the Wall making their way to Castle Black and at night, they would stay in whatever castle or fort the Wall had. It was slow travel, and they were cautious of enemies. They had reached Sable Hall when they heard the news that Lord Jon Snow had been killed by treasonous men.

The news had made that they would go to Lord Snow and see if he could provide any assistance to helping Rickon win his throne back. Lord Manderly and other allies were set to send messages to Lord Rickon at Castle Black. 

That night, Aldrith decided she would talk to her husband and have him head to an ally. Maybe the Karstarks whose keep was not too far from here. Surely, heading to Castle Black was no longer an option and they must rework the plan. Her husband’s room was near hers with Algar’s between the two of them. Algar had been her father’s strongest and most skilled warrior, as well as his oldest friend. When Lord Beorn Stane sent Algar, it showed how precious Aldrith was to him. 

As she walked past Algar’s room, she could hear the murmurs of Osha within. Recently, Osha and Algar had been sharing a bed. When she reached her husband’s room, she knocked lightly and entered. Shaggydog, the big black wolf, growled a half-hearted warning from in front of the meager fire in the fireplace. When Shaggy saw it was Aldritch, he lay his head back on his paws. 

From the noise of the wolf, Rickon looked up from his bed. He was all blue eyes and messy hair. His face was still dirty from dinner. In bed, he looked very small. Aldrith felt sympathy for him that one so young would be thrust in such a place and she felt sympathy for herself that this child was her husband.

Aldrith sat on his bed, “Excuse me, Rickon. I did not mean to wake you. I have been thinking, perhaps, we should not go to Castle Black. If your brother has been murdered, we may not find friends there or help at all. It may be a trap.”

Rickon looked at Aldrith in a distracted way and took a strand of her hair in his fingers which were also dirty. “Your hair reminds me of someone but I cannot remember who. I think she was my mother.”

Aldrith felt anger rise in her stomach, “Rickon, are you listening? Do you understand? Your brother, Jon, is dead. Maybe we should change our plans.”

Rickon let the hair drop from his fingers. He lay back down on his pillow, “I heard you. But Jon isn’t dead anymore. I saw him. He is fine and Sansa is going to him as well. No, we will continue to Castle Black as we planned.”

Aldrith was confused. How could he possibly know this? How could anyone who is dead, be alive again? How could Rickon see Jon? Aldrith spoke, “Rickon, how do you know these things?”

Rickon closed his eyes and rolled over, away from her, “I see things sometimes when I sleep. I call them my wolf dreams. Usually, I am Shaggy. But last night, I dreamed I was Jon’s wolf, Ghost, and a raven, and the horse Sansa rides. You will see, Aldrith. When we reach Castle Black, you will see that I am right. Now, I am tired… Good Night.”

Aldrith walked back to her room quickly. The hallways at Sable Hall were very cold and drafty. That night, Aldrith did not sleep well. She had too many things to think on.


End file.
